As Manchester continues to grow as an important business and leisure destination, one of the key beneficiaries is the city's car hire companies.

Whether based at the airport, the city's Piccadilly Train Station or dotted around the city itself, Manchester's car hire centres are reaping the rewards as tens thousands of people pour into the city each day.

If flying into Manchester Airport is your preferred method of getting here then there are plenty of options on offer if you fancy driving yourself around the region instead of relying on public transport or taxis.

Avis, Budget, Europcar, Hertz, National Car Rental and Sixt all have rental yards based there, while Hertz and Avis also have branches near Piccadilly.

Away from the airport and train station, two of the city's major road tributaries, Chester Road and Oldham Road, are also home to a number of car hire companies.

Manchester Car Hire Articles

A new drive to cut premiums

Peter Sharples

Motorists in Manchester are still paying more than twice the national average for motor insurance.

With the exception of Liverpool, Manchester is the priciest city in Britain for car insurance premiums - with drivers paying 55 per cent above the norm.

Researchers from Confused.com, the online comparison site for insurance premiums, analysed more than 27,000 quotations for motorists across the country. They discovered that although the average premium for Manchester motorists has fallen slightly in the last three months, the city remains a major hot-spot.

"Motorists in Manchester are continuing to suffer from high car insurance premiums even though rates have fallen slightly, which goes against the national trend," said Kate Armstrong, managing director of Confused.com.

Her researchers found that the average premium for a Manchester driver fell from £941.68 to £916.23 - a modest reduction of 2.7 per cent from the previous quarter. But this is still 55 per cent higher than the national average of £590.26.

"This extensive research indicates that Manchester has bucked the trend when it comes to car insurance premiums," Kate added.

"Although prices are still comparatively high in relation to the rest of the country, premiums have fallen, which can only be judged as positive.

"However, the clear message from the research is that the only way to be sure of finding a good deal is for drivers in Manchester to shop around."

Among the key findings of the research, Confused.com discovered Liverpudlians suffer the worst premium prices in the UK and are having to pay almost £350 more for their motor insurance than the national average.

At the other end of the scale, Dundee remained the UK's cheapest city for car insurance with average premiums at £451.08, 24 per cent below the national average. The two other 'ripe' areas for low insurance are Swindon (£464.03) and Norwich (£463.50).

Armstrong says Confused.com saves drivers an average of £156 in insurance premiums.

Since its launch in January 2003, the website claims to have saved drivers in excess of £40m.

Babies to boom in skip hire

Patricia Roberts

KATY ATTWOOD is out to bin the cowboy image of skip-hire firms.

With husband Mark, she has just launched an online environmentally friendly service based in West Gorton, which promises to recycle 70 per cent of waste collected across the whole of Greater Manchester.

And the firm, Topskips.com, is also offering a novel "baby" skip, which it believes will change the face of the skip hire business.

The baby skip is a one-tonne capacity heavy-duty refuse sack which is simple to use, doesn't take up the same room as a steel skip and is much cheaper to hire.

"We set up the baby skips because we know how disruptive it can be to have a skip stuck on your drive. Our baby skips are small enough not to disrupt your daily life, but are really robust," said Katy, who says Manchester City Council has shown interest in the idea.

Katy has a business background, having worked in accountancy and shipping around the world. Now she aims to give a new friendly face to the skip trade.

She said: "There are a lot of cowboys in the skip-hire industry. When we did our research before setting up the business, we found massive discrepancies in price, service and punctuality.

"When Mark and I phoned round for quotes to hire a skip, not only were there wide differences in the prices quoted by the different companies, but the same firms quoted different prices to him and to me - and they were always dearer when they were dealing with the woman!

"We wanted to take the lottery element out of hiring a skip.

"Our aim is to make the whole industry more friendly and environmentally responsible."

Katy says that Greater Manchester produces around 32 lbs of waste per household per week, and recycles only three per cent of the waste, disposing of 4.6 million tonnes of waste in ever-shrinking landfill each year.

Topskip has a facility for sorting waste, into paper, plastic, wood, etc, and then re-cycling the various components.

"We take pride in the fact that we promise to recycle at least 70 per cent of people's rubbish and regularly reach a much higher figure than that," she said.

Car insurance is driven down

Peter Sharples

An insurance "price war" is paying dividends for motorists in Manchester after five years of paying premiums way above the national average.

Manchester is already experiencing a greater drop in the cost of premiums than anywhere else in the UK, according to independent car insurance search site, Confused.com

Between July and September the average price of car insurance in Manchester fell by £10.40 to £1133.16 - a drop of 0.9 per cent. Nationwide, the average price of car insurance for the same period fell by £6.17 to £710.01.

Kate Armstrong, from Confused.com, said: "The research shows that the insurance market has become increasingly competitive over the last three months.

Drivers

"Stimulated by an increasing number of insurers fighting for the same number of drivers, competition has led to price cuts. There are great bargains to be had for those who conduct thorough searches."

Confused.com found that in Manchester from July to September, economy car insurance premiums fell by 0.2 per cent, from £730.18 to £728.18; family car insurance dropped 0.4 per cent, from £1157.28 to £1152.70 and performance car insurance fell by a more significant 2.7 per cent, from £2728.51 to £2655.34.

Armstrong added: "You only have to look to the findings of our research to see that while the insurance industry average for car insurance in Manchester, taking into account economy, family and performance classes of car - is £1133.16, the average cheapest price found by Confused.com was £916.41 - so it makes sense to search and save."

INDEPENDENT insurance broker Opus is issuing clients with Accident Packs to revolutionise the insurance claim process.

Designed to be kept in the glove box, the packs include a disposable camera, pen and an accident report.

County spreads out to Oldham

COUNTY Car and Van Hire has opened a new depot in Oldham as part of its continuing north west expansion.

The £3.5m-turnover company has taken on a 7,000 sq ft site in the town, its first foray outside south Manchester.

The depot opened on the September 1, with a fleet of up to 50 vehicles.

County Car and Van Hire was established in 1989, by John Briggs and managing director David Orritt, with two staff and 10 vehicles.

The Stockport-based company now operates a fleet of 600 vehicles and employs 38 people.

"The Oldham depot is the first step on our growth plan, which is to expand to various strategic locations around the M60. We want to be able to

service the whole of the Greater Manchester area, using the ring road as a guide."

Bee plan to crack down on bogus hire cabs

A SCHEME to crack down on bogus private hire cabbies preying on revellers in Manchester city centre is revealed today.

The move follows concern over a student's murder and a Manchester Evening News investigation into the danger of rogue cabs.

Huge yellow and black bee stickers - funded by the council - will be placed on the bonnet of each of the city's 3,000 licensed private hire cars. The stickers - supported by police - will also carry each car's licence plate and display warnings that cabs must be booked in advance otherwise insurance is invalid.

The scheme will be introduced in the city in July 2002 to coincide with the Commonwealth Games and talks will be held with a view to extending the idea across Greater Manchester.

Proposals to order all cabs to be resprayed have been abandoned because of the cost, but a standard colour, probably white, is set to be phased in. Private hire cars will also be able to carry adverts on their doors to help drivers pay rising insurance bills.

The scheme follows an unprecedented response to an M.E.N. investigation which revealed the large number of bogus cabbies in Manchester. We showed how unlicensed drivers were preying on late-night revellers.

Assaults

Two women have been raped and four sexually assaulted by rogue drivers during the last few months. Earlier this year, the M.E.N. reported how police believe there may be a serial sex attacker posing as a cabbie.

Five years ago, Salford University student Rachel Thacker, 22, was battered to death after getting into a bogus cab in the city centre. Her killer, Duncan Bermingham, was jailed for life.

City council leader Richard Leese said: "These measures should make it virtually impossible for someone to pretend to be a private hire driver when they are not.

"It will also make it easier to catch bogus cabbies because it will make them easier to identify on CCTV. The M.E.N. has been instrumental in delivering a very, very strong message that things have to change."

Private hire representatives also backed the plans. Paul Meek, chairman of the Central Manchester Private Hire Association, said: The M.E.N. has been fantastic, achieving virtually overnight what we have sought over the last few years."

The plans will now go out for consultation before being referred to the licensing committee for final approval.

Thumbs down to 'guinea pig' city car trial

Clasrissa Satchell

A pay-as-you-go car trial in Manchester would prompt an outcry from business - and 'Big Brother' complaints from civil liberties groups.

The Department for Transport has said Manchester is in the running to become a pilot for a scheme to charge drivers up to £1.34 a mile during rush hour.

Each car and lorry would be fitted with a black box to monitor all journeys.

Emma Antrobus, from Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce, said: "We've been talking about road charges for years and some businesses believe there is a certain inevitability about them."

But she believes the majority of Manchester's businesses would be against a pilot scheme.

"If you look at other computer-based schemes that have gone forward nationally, like passports and child tax, the government doesn't have a great record of bringing them in smoothly and it could be very disruptive.

Revenue

"I think people would be reluctant to be seen as guinea pigs. But we need a solution to congestion and there is no easy option."

Paul Watters, head of road and transport policy for the AA motoring trust, also foresees technical problems. "It could be very confusing for people trying to understand the different tariffs.

"The idea of doing a pilot could help iron out some of the problems and I think Manchester has all the ingredients, being encircled by the M60 and a vibrant city with a light rapid transport scheme.

"It will be very interesting to see the impact on cities. There will be impacts on retail but since every city is different even a pilot scheme in one city might not give the full picture."

Improved

Steve Housham from Transport 2000, the national environmental transport body, said they supported road charging but public transport schemes like Metrolink should be improved first.

Brian Gregory, a founder of the Association of British Drivers, said he thought people in Manchester would refuse to allow the pilot. "I can foresee this becoming the government's poll tax on wheels. For it to work everyone will have to have a black box in their car and people will refuse on civil liberty grounds, I certainly will."

Steven Durrant, secretary for Manchester Green Party, said: "Although it's a good thing to try to reduce congestion, it is not challenging reliance on the car but just making people use their cars in other places instead.

"There's also a civil liberties angle in terms of tracking cars using satellite technology."

A spokesman for civil liberties action group Christian Voice said: "The technology they depend on will track every vehicle fitted with the 'spy-in-the-car' black box.

"Motorists will be paying for the transmitter and for the miles they drive, but the spin-off is that the government will know where every car is at every moment."

A Transport Department spokesman said: "Nowhere has been selected as the pilot yet, but we need to pick somewhere with a potential congestion problem that is also a large urban area. Clearly Manchester, and other places, fit that description."

Insurance 'should reflect cut in car crime'

Police today called for sky-high car insurance premiums in Greater Manchester to be slashed following a huge fall in vehicle crime here.

A new survey by the AA - yet to be published but seen by the Manchester Evening News - reveals that premiums have rocketed by nearly ten per cent in the area and remain among the highest in the country despite an 11.9 per cent fall in vehicle crime.

Motorists suspect the benefit of a massive fall in car crime is not being passed on to the consumer.

The AA's Ford Focus survey - based on an "average" couple driving a mid-range car - showed that Wythenshawe, Prestwich, and Middleton have lost their titles as the most expensive places in the country for fully comprehensive insurance.

Last year's survey showed it cost £567-a-year in those areas. The new survey will show that premiums have fallen in these areas, with car insurance costing £530 in Wythenshawe, £528 in Prestwich and £529 in Middleton.

However, the average for the Greater Manchester postal district has risen 9.3 per cent from £502 last year to this year's £549, well above the national average of £369.

The L6 postal district in Liverpool is now the most expensive area in the country to insure a car, at £639.

Reward

Insurance companies should now reduce their premiums in Greater Manchester to reflect a huge fall in car crime, according to police chiefs.

"All major car insurance companies should take cognisance of the hard work which has taken place here to reduce car crime and they should reward policy-holders as such," said Supt Peter Aaronson, of the Trafford police division.

On May 7, the MEN revealed that Home Office officials were studying a remarkable fall in crime in the Trafford division, which easily beat the performance of the ten other Greater Manchester police divisions and where there were 12.1 per cent fewer offences reported.

A major factor was the reduction in Trafford's vehicle crime, which fell 31 per cent in the year to March, with 5,800 thefts of and from vehicles, 1,796 fewer than the year before. But the AA survey will reveal the average premium in Trafford rose from £551 to £575.

Across Greater Manchester, car crime fell by 11.9 per cent.

It has led to the suspicion that, although quick to increase premiums when car crime rises, insurance companies are much slower to pass the benefit of reduced car crime and fewer claims to the consumer.

An AA spokesman agreed premiums in the region would come down, but said: "The change isn't overnight. If there's a sustained period of reduced car crime and a reduction in claims, I think we would expect to see some sort of reduction in your car insurance, or alternatively a slow-down in the rate of increase. That may be a more realistic expectation."

Malcolm Tarling, spokesman for the Association of British Insurers, said the reduction in car crime, although welcome, was only one element of the risk which was taken into account and he added that growing compensation claims, such as for whiplash injuries, was increasingly significant.

He said: "Companies set premium rates to reflect claims experience in particular areas. Theft claims form only about 12 per cent of the total number of claims insurers deal with. We also have a significant rise in the cost of third-party compensation claims.

"One cost area for insurers in Greater Manchester has fallen but another has risen throughout the region and in the country. You can't assume that because the crime rate has gone down that car insurance premiums will go down accordingly.

"Having said that, it's a very competitive market and if you shop around you can save as much as 30 per cent."

Jag with a snag

Doris Mousdale became a fugitive from the law after she unwittingly "stole" a £30,000 Jaguar in a car-hire blunder at Manchester Airport.

Police were called in and she was eventually "collared" the next day in Southampton after her husband had called to say: "You are in charge of a stolen vehicle."

The drama began when British-born Doris, who is in her mid-50s, arrived at Manchester Airport following a 24-hour flight from New Zealand, where she has lived for 18 years.

Doris, who runs a book website in Auckland, had pre-booked a Vauxhall Astra hire car with Alamo so she could get to a family wedding on the Isle of Wight.

She had been told the basic model she had wanted was not available and to expect an upgrade.

So when she was handed the keys to a blue S-type Jag - which when new is worth nearly £30,000 - outside the Alamo office in Terminal 2 she was surprised and delighted.

The only snag was that the car belonged to someone else. The error was partly down to a woman from holiday parking company Chauffeured Parking Services who, by coincidence, was standing outside the Alamo office.

Unaware

She simply gave the Jag to the wrong person without checking, said Doris.

When the real owner, a doctor from Stoke-on-Trent, turned up, police were called in and Doris became a "fugitive from the law".

Doris was unaware of the drama as she drove in unexpected opulence down the M6 towards Southampton.

She thought it was unusual the hire company had left hardly any petrol in the tank and that there were Polo mints and driving gloves in the glove compartment as well as heart-monitoring equipment in the back.

But, given the luxury of her Jag, with just 1,000 miles on the clock, she wasn't too concerned.

Meanwhile, police launched a hunt of global proportions. Officers called the travel agent in New Zealand through which the Astra had been booked, who eventually tracked down Doris's husband Peter to Singapore, where he was on business.

Peter, an academic at Auckland University, called his wife on her mobile while she was somewhere near Warwick, by this time with two sisters-in-law as passengers.

"It was so funny, although it wasn't funny at the time when my husband said I was in charge of a stolen vehicle. It was like Thelma and Louise," Doris told the M.E.N. after we tracked her down, staying with family for another wedding in Liverpool, where she was brought up.

Error

Doris had delivered the Jag to the Alamo office in Southampton the next day, where she was given a Vauxhall Zafira instead. The Jag has now been returned to its rightful owner.

Declining to be named, the Jag owner, said: "It was a simple error and I have absolutely no complaints. I have been treated very well."

Doris said: "I drive a Jaguar Sovereign back home and like all Jag drivers I'm very careful. I can assure him of that. It was a very nice drive.

"I must admit I thought it was strange they had left Polo mints and driving gloves in there and there were no Alamo contact numbers. The owner being a doctor would explain why there was ECG equipment in the back. I thought they were just sub-leasing someone's car. I wasn't worried about it or concerned about it at all."

She added: "It was about half-past five in the morning when I got off the plane and there was a woman in a red jacket with a clipboard outside the Alamo office. I didn't realise she wasn't from Alamo. I said, `Do you want to see my driving licence and voucher?' and she said, `No, we only do that for the young guys'.

"I actually said it was a wonderful service and that it was wonderful to have a Jag. It was the first flight in and the owner must have been on the same flight as me. She handed me the keys and I put my luggage in and I was off.

"They did a good job to find me because of the time differences."

A source at Manchester Airport told the M.E.N: "We couldn't believe it when we heard the story. She must have been well-impressed with the upgrade, if not the fuel-consumption."

No one at Chauffeured Parking Services was available for comment.

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